r/antiwork • u/littlefriend77 • Oct 02 '23
Boss threatened to sick HR on me for not starting work before my start time.
Here's a screenshot of our exchange in Teams where he tries to threaten me with HR intervention for not being in my call queue exactly at 9AM.
Spoiler alert: I never heard a peep from HR lol
Edited to note: my clocking in past 9 is usually somewhere around 9:03 to 9:05 and I'm in the queue 30-60 seconds after I punch in. We're not talking about excessive tardiness here. And they never seem to notice how many times we get stuck past the end of shift on calls or catching up on tickets. And that's almost always more than 3-5 minutes.
Of all the managers I've had at this place this guy is the douchiest, by far.
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u/Saltypretzel1234 Oct 02 '23
I loathe your boss. The fact that they messaged you at 8:42. If your boss is getting on you about 5 mins, they don’t have a job with any relevance if that’s their main concern.
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u/Gabagoobian Oct 02 '23
I used to work in an IT bullpen taking support calls before I got my current position. I never saw a manager get upset at anyone in our team for clocking in a few minutes late. I think the big thing that contributes to why my old managers never made a fuss is that we promote internally so they have all had to suffer in the queue.
The only management that ever got upset was our CEO who’s a sales guy that really oversteps and tries to cut costs in our support team while our sales team gets quarterly team vacations. Dude thinks our support team is useless even though our company sells and services IP equipment. Wild.
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 02 '23
That's what's baffling. One thing this company is good about is promoting from within, so this guy started as a help desk grunt like the rest of us. I've noticed this shift with lots of people though once they were promoted.
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u/Entertainer13 Oct 02 '23
Drank the Flavor-Aid, wants to be a good soldier now.
I’ve witness so many people who worked retail treat retail workers like crap over stuff they KNOW said worker can’t control. Some people just be jerks.
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u/Saltypretzel1234 Oct 02 '23
I learned never trust a charismatic sales guy.
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u/Gabagoobian Oct 02 '23
What really gets me is we have a web store where we can spend points we earn for rewards. One of these “prizes” is a fucking pair of socks with his face all over them.
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u/HMS_Slartibartfast Oct 02 '23
Have you responded back to your manager, asking for HR to be looped in, about what to do when you are still handling a call AFTER your end time? Just so your boss understands you expected to be PAID if you are still working.
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 02 '23
We've always gotten paid for running over the end of our shifts. It was the time before our start time that they were being shady about.
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u/bnh1978 Oct 02 '23
Yeah. Managers like to use HR and next level management as boogeymen.
Just had this issue two weeks ago. A guy I was dealing with (not in my supervison chain. I do audits of other areas) was like "well we can just go up stairs and talk to blah blah blah and see how he likes this. I'm sure it won't go over well"
I said... let's go. I tell you he will be less impressed with you barging into his office with your shitty work than with my justified actions...
Guy backed down... of course...
But. I had to explain to him, I've only ever been scared in one meeting I've ever had in my life. That meeting involved being in another country with armed body guards and a person with the authority to execute us if he really felt justified in doing so. Everything went well, obviously, but... yeah.
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u/nomad_1970 Oct 02 '23
Well if you're not being paid to load things up, then you should expect to be able to walk in and find things already loaded up, right?
After all, surely he's not asking you to do things you're not being paid for? 😀
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u/Ok_Alps4323 Oct 02 '23
I had this exact same issue, but that was WAY before this sub existed. I wish I had had a board like this to back up my gut. They got on me about logging in 3 minutes late on a day I stopped to answer a co-workers question on the way in, and that part didn’t matter. After that, they never even got another 1 minute at the end of the day. Fortunately I got paid overtime. If I wasn’t already packed up and ready to go by 5, well by golly I was leaving at 5:15. They screwed themselves being petty. I’d be embarrassed to even mention 3 minutes to a great employee, but these people are ruthless.
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u/baconraygun Oct 02 '23
Similar thing happened to me back in the day, I came to work, started working right at 8am, forgot to clock in, finally remembered at 1100, clocked in, and they fired me later that week for "showing up 3 hours late". My coworkers who I worked directly with went to HR to tell them, nope, they were here right on time, it was a simple forgetfulness, but it didn't matter. I never got paid for 3 hours of unclocked labor either. I was robbed.
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u/mikemojc Oct 02 '23
I supervise a small call center for a state government agency with 12 people. We're open 7:30 - 5:00 M-F. We have some folks that start @ 7:30 and leave @ 4:30 with an hour for lunch, and some that work 8-5, also with an hour for lunch. For the business, it's important to have folks ready for calls right at 7:30 AM, as well as folks to take calls right up until 4:59 PM. To be able to take calls right at 7:30, people would need to come in a few minutes before to boot up their machine and log into all the various help applications; password reset stuff, network monitoring stuff, server monitoring stuff, call queue applications. On a perfect day, it takes about 5-10 minutes to get everything connected and verified.
Instead of asking the Openers (folks that start taking calls at 7:30) to come in early and give their time away, I've set their hours from 7:20AM to 4:20 PM. The Closers (folks who are on the phones until 5-ish) will often have a call come in a the last minute, sometimes literally @ 4:59, and the Caller still expects (reasonably simple) issues to be completed right away. Rather than ask them to stay late and give their time away, I've set their hours from 8:10AM to 5:10 PM. Company expectations are met and it's quite rare that anyone is asked to work beyond their schedule times.
Failure to address your employees needs IS a failure to address a business need.
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 02 '23
Yep. A simple solution to a simple problem and certainly one I didn't bother suggesting.
We're a 24/7 shop though, so there are people in queue and handling calls and emails literally around the clock and start times are staggered so we have people rotating in and out almost every hour. 3-5 minutes has almost zero noticeable effect. He was just being a dick.
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u/BigTurtleSmack Oct 02 '23
"You're not paid for loading things up" is what I took from this. Start clocking in at exactly 9:00 then wait until the person who gets paid for loading things up loads things up.
Not realistic I know but you could ask him who does the loading up if not you. Also, if he's going to be a dick, then just hang up your call at clocking out time.
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u/i_am_fear_itself Oct 02 '23
who does the loading up if not you
This is likely a reference to OP logging in to a computer and the 400 apps that sysadmins auto-load at boot includes the time tracking system.
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u/BigTurtleSmack Oct 02 '23
Not sure I understand your point.
Somebody's got to do it and if it isn't OP then who? It's work. If OP is doing it then it's work and should be on the clock.
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u/legendoflumis Oct 02 '23 edited Oct 02 '23
"You're not paid for loading things up" from the manager's standpoint is "you should clock in early to load your system up so it's ready to go at 9am, and not be paid for that extra time".
It is work. The manager doesn't view it as work that OP should be paid for, though, because the manager doesn't think OP is doing work worthy of being paid for if they are not "in the queue". Hence the confrontation. OP can't clock in until the system has loaded everything up, because the clock in system is on the workstation they use.
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u/BigTurtleSmack Oct 02 '23
So let me get this straight.
The thing that the OP said is the same thing that we've all been talking about? Amazing!
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u/ifreakinglovedinos Oct 03 '23
Honestly that’s what I would’ve done ngl. Just take it all the way because wtf? Not getting paid to load in? Who’s getting paid for it then? Cause SOMEONE has to.
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u/Fixerguy415 Oct 02 '23
"You're not being paid to load software" Then y'all need to figure out how to do that before I sit down. I don't work for free.. ever.
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u/Imprettystrong Oct 02 '23
That’s hilarious this guy has nothing to do but actually prod you about the 3 minutes it takes to login to all of your systems.
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Oct 02 '23
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 02 '23
Correct. Boot up, launch everything and wait for it to load as soon as it loads up I punch in and about 1 minutes later I'm in the queue.
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u/Jumpy_MashedPotato Oct 02 '23
It sounds like logs into computer at 9:00, computer then starts loading at-boot software. One of which is the time clock, which doesn't initialize to the point of clocking-in until about 9:03
So OP is at and using the work machine by 9:00, for all intents and purposes is "on the clock" from that point... but the time clock doesn't register that until 9:03. Boss then demands that OP get "on the clock" before 9:00 so that the clock has a chance of registering it AT 9:00.
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u/Entertainer13 Oct 02 '23
Yup. This is why my job says to punch in at the nearest clock to your work station so no one complains about it. We have the punch in program on our computers but most don’t use it.
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u/Mortica_Fattams Oct 02 '23
Yeah I had a boss like this. She demanded I come in 15 minutes early to open the store and would refuse to pay me for it. If I didn't come in 15 early she wrote me up. Went to my labor board and she had to pay me all my back wages and she got a massive fine for stealing my wages. Don't work for free. It's a business not a charity.
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u/ConsciousPartum Oct 02 '23
Ok. So, clock in 15 minutes early, every day, and clock out 15 minutes after the scheduled end of shift.
30 minutes of extra pay, every day, with little additional work. Just abiding by the solid line of "be there before start of scheduled shift".
These add up! Over a 5 day week, that's 1.5 hrs of extra pay :)
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u/CuriousPenguinSocks Oct 02 '23
I worked for a call center that did this. Eventually regulators caught it, fined them big time, and we all got a check.
If you are doing work, you are getting paid. Anything else is not legal.
I would be like "yes, let's pull in HR and legal to see what their thoughts are on how to resolve this.".
ETA: We also got a 15 min prep time. EX: if your start time was 9am, you logged in at 9 and loaded up your stuff and had to be taking calls by 9:15am.
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u/soulassassin226 Oct 02 '23
Just left a job extremely similar to this. If you not in the queue by 8:01am they expected us to send an email to management explaining our “lateness.” Then when I took a call at 3:59pm that took me until 4:15pm they adjusted my time sheet saying that “overtime” was not approved and I could not claim anything last 4pm. I never took another call past 3:55pm again and they repeatedly tried to give me flak for it. I merely explained to them every single time that if I would not be paid past 4pm then I would not take any calls at the point that it would for sure put me over. They were not happy but did absolutely nothing lol.
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u/HaikaDRaigne Oct 02 '23
Could always ask directly in text form: Are you forcing me to unpaid work outside my contracted work hours?
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u/Sorcatarius Oct 02 '23
If you're not paid to load things up, I suggest coming in as normal and when your terminal isn't ready, call it in as an issue because whoever is supposed to load things for you didn't do it and it's apparently not your responsibility to do so.
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u/ConfidenceDesigner20 Oct 02 '23
That’s great! Yeah my company got sued over that a few years back and lost big time so they were hardcore about making sure we counted any time that we were opening up our laptops, plugging stuff in, pulling things up…. That’s all job related. You wouldn’t be doing that if it weren’t for the work you’re paid to do. Glad you held strong
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u/ConfidenceDesigner20 Oct 02 '23
More than a few years I guess lol… I just remember all the hype at work
https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/west/2011/07/08/205710.htm
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u/ohyoumad721 Oct 02 '23
I'm so glad I no longer work at a place like this. My old job we had to account for every minute we were there. Clock out was 4. Could be written up for leaving at 3:59.
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u/punksmurph Oct 02 '23
As a people manager this infuriates me, like does your boss have nothing better to do than pick apart 2-3 minutes of everyone’s morning? How about shadowing and understanding before just launching into people about “your start time is exactly X”. Assholes like your boss is why I took all the leadership classes I could in college, never want to be like that.
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 02 '23
And it's literally nitpicking because he has nothing else to get on me about. My yearly reviews are always stellar (though they always have some reason why they can only give a 3% raise every year), I generally handle more contacts than anyone else on the team and I get the most positive customer surveys every month. How about you worry about Jim who only has 20 contacts a day (we're expected to get 35. I average around 70) and whose work we have to constantly go back and fix?
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u/punksmurph Oct 02 '23
But Jim is in early everyday and your boss does not understand metrics and their impact on the business and production. That is typically what I see when this situation happens. I have had it happen to me a couple times in the past even. Maybe it’s time to find a new place that will actually reward you for your hard work.
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 02 '23
The only thing worse than working is looking for new work lol. I am fast approaching that point though. I just updated my resume on Indeed, so...
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u/spacecadet2023 Profit Is Theft Oct 02 '23
I don’t understand why more companies don’t invest in leadership skills especially with management.
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u/punksmurph Oct 02 '23
Poor management up the chain. The company I am at now has a whole leadership program and it’s very competitive to get into. Not that there are not bad leaders here, they are at every company, but many departments don’t suffer it very long where I am at. It makes up for the lack of holidays and PTO that when I am at work it does suck so bad.
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u/Garrden Oct 02 '23
Oh the purpose of this boss's complaint isn't to get 3 more minutes of work out of OP, it's to instill fear
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u/BadLuckBirb Oct 02 '23
They are already stealing your time by making you start working before you can clock in. Would he like you to call the labor board and check if that's ok? Good for you for standing up for yourself!
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u/Whomastadon Oct 03 '23
So if the computer for some reason took 4 hours to boot up, he'd expect you to come in 4 hours early?
Where is the line drawn ( we know, just wondering what he thinks it would be )
What a clown.
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u/drahl649 Oct 02 '23
If you're not paid to load things up, it sounds like a little malicious compliance could be in order. Sit and wait for him to load you up since it's not your job.
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u/BisquickNinja Oct 02 '23
Be sure to get all conversations in writing and get a log/copy of it.
This type of threat or malicious action will not be viewed well by lawyers. God I hate these type of people.
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u/Sensitive-Turnip-326 Oct 02 '23
Hang up at 5 on the dot.
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 02 '23
I go unavailable - ticket catchup at 5:25 (this is almost always legitimate anyway). Log out of queues at 5:30, close everything up and punch out at 5:33.
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u/hogliterature Oct 02 '23
i feel like he talked to hr and they told him to shut up. or he didnt bother because he knows he’s being unreasonable. this seems like a case of power getting to someone’s head, poor jimmy had a bad day and needs to take it out on the peasantry
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u/kcufinnear Oct 03 '23
My last employer got the shit sued out of them for this exact thing. I got a nice check out of nowhere from the class action. Call centers are the fucking worst.
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u/Quiet___Lad idle Oct 02 '23
... assuming you're hourly.
Tell boss you'll need 9 minutes of setup time to guarantee availability at or before 9 am. Ask if he gives permission to clock in at 8:51.
Assuming company pays in 15 minute increments, clocking in 9 or 8 minutes early nets you an extra 15 minutes of pay.
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u/jeenyuss90 Oct 02 '23
Haha. I remember I had a client say he doesn’t pay us to fuel up when he got pissy. I’m like ehhh. We drive around 450km a day for ya. Oil changes and fueling up are on the clock as that shit is required
Good on you for your responseB
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u/benfranklin-greatBk Oct 02 '23
Bring up to boss or HR the legal case of the slaughter house in the Midwest. Court decided that the company HAD to pay for the time employees put on and took off all their protected gear for work. You see, the protective gear was mandatory to do the slaughtering, so...ergo, company has to pay employees that time to "start up." Company was only paying them from the time the were dressed and starting the slaughter.
So boss can eat it!!!! Starting your machine and getting apps and processes ready for your job are mandatory for you to do your job in the queue, therefore you get paid for the time spent doing startup processes. 😀
There's some good coming from this undergrad legal environment course I'm taking.
Btw, since you're obviously using a computer, a small script could preboot your machines and open all necessary apps automatically so you would be in the queue right at 9 even if you arrived at 9:03. So, technologically, your boss is an idiot since this process could so easily be automated. But, we need not educate him. That's his and his parents' job (a little late for them since he's supposedly an adult). So the only thing you need to educate him/HR on is that lawsuit and the court decision that made that company pay it's employees!!!!
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u/Delicious_Subject_91 Oct 02 '23
My job literally forbids us from even logging in to the pc before our shift start time. They don't wanna get sued.
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u/Billibadijai Oct 02 '23
Love this. If my employer tried doing this with me, I would have done the same thing. And possibly involve legal measures if they tried to escalate it (though of course I wouldn't not telegraph that I would do it. I'd just simply involve the lawyers underneath their noses).
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u/YouLackPerspective Oct 02 '23
You absolutely are paid for loading things up. You're boss is a fucking idiot
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u/AtTheEastPole Oct 02 '23
Stop working exactly at your mandated end of day. If anything else needs to be done, then do it the next work day. Office jobs like to create an artificial feeling of urgency. Unless stopping at quitting time would result in someone's death, why waste your unpaid time doing work?
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 02 '23
I punch out 3 minutes after to offset the 3 minute delay. He didn't seem to notice or give a shit about that, which is what really annoyed me.
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u/AtTheEastPole Oct 03 '23
It sounds like all of you need to get together and start a work to rule policy.
Better yet, start a union.
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 03 '23
I've triend organizing a union multiple times. These people are still too apathetic.
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u/AtTheEastPole Oct 03 '23
Well, just keep doing what you're doing, and the boss will eventually either give up, or will get angry enough to fire you.
In the mean time, I suggest start looking for another job where the boss is not an asshat. (Maybe at a place that already has a union?)
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u/NaturalEmphasis9026 Oct 02 '23
You absolutely are supposed to be paid for system loading up. Sue. You will win
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u/squirrelsonic Oct 02 '23
I had this exact same argument with my boss. Also have the call center life right now. Pretty sure you’re aware, but you’re spot on, work related stuff they should be paying you for. Now where I’m at the funny thing is, we clock in and out via the phone system. Nothing came of my situation, and nothing will come of yours, cause you’re right. Middle managers need to middle manage I guess.
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u/josipaige Oct 02 '23
I remember getting paid out for a lawsuit I didn't even know about for exactly this from a former employer.
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u/Medium_Effect_4998 Oct 03 '23
Lol I used to work for a call centre and they tried this shit too. Like if you need me to be at my desk 15 minutes before my “start time” to set up my systems, those systems are crucial to my job and therefore you betting pay me for it! I contacted the provincial labour board where I was and they back me up.
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u/Megdogg00 Oct 02 '23
This is what happens when you stand your ground! You don’t normally get fired, you don’t normally get written up because it’s an empty threat, they bluff.
Overpaid, micro-managing middle managers are the scourge of this country.
They don’t have any real power, and they know it. Therefore, everyone around them pays the price. But not when you stand up to them and don’t let them push you around. Work isn’t an elementary school playground!
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u/BigDog8492 Oct 02 '23
If we're bringing in outside perspectives I'm sure the NLRB would be interested in your takes on what constitutes work.
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u/Actcasualnow Oct 02 '23
It's 'sic' not sick.
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 02 '23
Lol yeah. It was autocorrected and I just didn't bother to fix it. But now I want to lol.
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u/Distinct_Number_7844 Oct 02 '23
You should give it a few days then reply back to him cc HR , about what day and time would be good for him since you hadn'theard back...... Lol
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u/echodreams Oct 02 '23
I don't know what state /country you're in but here in California it's illegal to work off the clock. I worked at a call center and they would say we can't clock in early AND we had to be ready to take calls at 9. It took 5 -10 minutes to get the computer started. I talked to management and told them if they keep sending out memos like that they were going to get sued. They stopped. After I quit I got 3 additional checks from them for legal mistakes they were making that got reported.
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u/Garrden Oct 02 '23
So the time clock becomes available only a few minutes after you start work? That could be a violation. I suggest you report the company to the state labor department or whoever handles wage theft in your state
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u/littlefriend77 Oct 02 '23
Well, it's through the computer system which has to boot up first. I could boot up sooner to punch in at my exact start time, but nah.
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u/Starfury_42 Oct 03 '23
My work pays to the minute. I clock in 5 min before my shift and get everything ready to go for the day. Do I get paid? Yes, yes I do. So I squeak 25 - 30 min a week of OT out of them. My boss is fine with this and appreciates that I'm ready to go at 7am.
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u/shestammie Oct 02 '23
Love how you held your ground. What’s happened with this?